Summary:The first Mardi Gras in America was celebrated in Mobile, Alabama in 1703. In 2007, it is still racially segregated. Tracing the exotic world of secret mystic societies and centuries-old traditions and pageantry; diamond-encrusted crowns, voluminous, hand-sewn gown, surreal masks and enormous paper mache floats, a tangled web of historical violence and power dynamics is uncovered, elusive forces that keep this hallowed tradition organized along enduring color lines.